DOD Force Mix Issues

In the wake of the Defense Department's (DOD) continuing efforts to downsize, this report identifies ways for the military services to achieve operational efficiencies and budget savings through greater use of civilian personnel in support positions. GAO concludes that by replacing more military forces in support roles with civilians, DOD could significantly reduce personnel costs--on average, each civilian support employee costs $15,000 less per year than a comparably graded military person--and release military personnel for combat duties. In addition, this report addresses the need to include requirements for civilian employees and contractors in contingency planning processes to ensure that they will be fully prepared to deploy to future conflicts, when needed. GAO also follows up on steps taken to correct problems identified after DOD and the services assessed civilian deployments to the Persian Gulf.

GAO found that: (1) although DOD and the services have attempted to convert military positions to civilian positions, the extent of these changes appears limited, since the ratio of military personnel to civilian personnel has not changed significantly; (2) replacing military personnel with civilian employees could reduce military personnel costs and release military members for use in combat-specific duties; (3) some DOD-sponsored studies have determined that civilian employees in peacetime support functions cost the government about $15,000 less per year than military employees in comparable pay grades; (4) service officials are reluctant to replace military personnel with civilian employees because the military is downsizing, they believe they can exert greater control over military personnel, they often do not receive sufficient funds or information to support civilian replacements, and budget allocation and civilian personnel requirement decisions are often made separately; and (5) the services have made efforts to correct some of the problems identified during the Persian Gulf deployment, but they have not identified their future potential wartime requirements for DOD civilian employees or contractor personnel or taken adequate steps to ensure that these personnel remain in the services for future crises.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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